DOCSLIB.ORG

Robert L. Emory a Theoretical Discussion of People's War Political

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Robert L. Emory a Theoretical Discussion of People's War Political Robert L. Emory A Theoretical Discussion of People's War Political Science M.A. Thesis abstract The analytic concep~ of "revolutionary perspective" is developed as a tool for explaining different concepts of and approaches to people's war. This involves three aspects: a writer, his specifie framework of people's war, and the national environment. Part one of the thesis examines national environment; part two discusses and analyzes the writings of Ernesto Guevara, Regis Debray, Vo Nguyen Giap, Truong Chinh, Frantz Fanon, and Mao Tse-tung. Part two of the thesis shows that there is a progression of sophistication in the views of the authors examined and this is reflected in the definitions of guerilla warfare, revolutionary warfare, national liberationary warfare, and people's war offered in part three. The thesis concludes that while local con­ ditions are extremely important in determining the path of a struggle an author's conception and definition of the struggle itself (whether considered as continuing after "national liberation" or not) can be more important. '.".'.• '.:r, A THEORETICAL DISCUSSION OF PEOPLE'S WAR by Robert L. Emory A thesis submitted to the Faculty of Graduate Studies and Research in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Arts in Political Science. McGil1 University Montreal, Canada Spring, 1970. l(i) Robert. L. F.morv 1970 1 i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS While this author alone is responsible for the analysis in this thesis he would like to thank the following for their valuable assistance: Professor S. J. Noumoff, the author"'s graduate advisor at McGi11 University; Professor Michael Elliot-Bateman, University of Manchester; William Rinton, author; and General Richard L. Clutterbuck, Ministry of Defense, Whitehall. \, " "TABLE OF CONTENTS Acknowledgements ••••••.••••••••••••.••.••••••••••. 1 Chapter l - Introduction •••••••••••••••••••••• ".... 1 Chapter II - Revolutionary Perspective: The Author and His National Environment •••••••• 14 Chapter III - Revolutionary Perspective: Specifie Frameworks of People's War 55 Chapter IV - Conclusion ••••••••••••••••••••••••••• 125 Bibliography ...................................... 136 CHAPTER l INTRODUCTION Lin Piao claims that the writings of Mao Tse-tung have, "not only been valid for China, (but also) a great contribution to the revolutionary struggles of the oppressed nations and people's throughout the world Comrade Mao Tse-tung's theory of people's war solves not only the problem of daring to fight a people's war, but 1 also that of how to wage it". Another view of Mao Tse-tung's writings was expressed in an article in the liorld Marxist Review. "On the ideological (emphasis in original) plane, the theses of the Chinese leaders come dangerously close to some of the most threadbare con- cepts of bourgeois and petty-bourgeois nationalism i~ Latin America •••• lt (the Chine se ideological campaign) has thus become a factor retarding the building of the national liberation fron and qaus,ing fdeological disunity 2 in the camp of Latin American revolution". 1 Lin Piao, Long Live the Victory of People's War!, (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1966), pp. 43, 47. 2 R. Arismendi, "Some Aspects of the Revolutionary Process in Latin America", (World Marxist Review, Vol. II, No. 4), p. 18 • .' 2 The polemical debate between Marxists and non­ Marxists, between Marxists of differing persuasions and between other groups and individuals has qot clarified the issue. Analysis based solely on doctrinaire ideological position leads, by its very nature, to a clouding of the question. In seeking to clarify different frameworks of people's war it is necessary to divorce the investigation from the polemical level and conduct an analysis which isolates and explains the specific formulations of each theory. In reading such diverse writers as Mao Tse-tung, Lin Piao, Regis Debray, Ernesto Guevara, General Vo Nguyen Giap, Truong Chinh, and Frantz Fanon one finds that rather than examining a constant, static condition for which one model of revolution could be sufficient. These writers are examining an ever-changing, dynamic situation. For these authors the laws of history dictate a scientific development of society. They see this development as both necessary and inevitable. But while this movement is a "constant" there is no consensus on the "tactical" means· to be used to carry· the process through to the end. While an historical imperative is 3 recognized by these writers there is no agreement beyond this recognition. Schafik BandaI, for example, has commented on the Chinese attempt to influence Latin American revolutionary movements by saying, "Beyond question, the attempt of the Chinese Communist Party leadership to impose their theoretical ideas on the wor1d revolutionary movement did, at a definite stage, exert a distinct influence on the polemics. But that influence has now waned and the debate is mainly on the real and basic problems of the Latin American (emphasis in original) revolution!'. 3 Recognizing that people's war revolves around a f1uid situation most authors warn that they are writing "an outline, not a bible". 4 Debray goes to great 1engths to offer an argument against doctrinaire acceptance of one formula. That an intellectual, especially if he is a bourgeois, should speak of startegy before aIl else is normal. Unfortunately, however, the right road, the only feasible one, sets out from tactical data, rising gradually to- 3Shafik BandaI, "Reflections on Continental Strategy ~or Latin American Revolution", (World Marxist Review, Vol. II, No. 4), p.SO. 4Ernesto Guevara, Guerilla Warfare,(New York: Monthly Review Press, 1961), p. 88. 4 ward a definition of strategy. The abuse of strategyand the lack of tactics isa delight­ fuI vice, characteristic of the contemplative man - a vice to which we, by writing these lines, must also plead guilty. All.the more reason to remain aware of the inversion (emphasis in original) of which we are victims when we read theoretical works.S In a different context Debray offers a justifi- cation for Revolution in the Revolution? It, he says, "had only one ambition: to play a part in breaking down a mental, theoretical, and practical block hindering the upsurge of the revolutionary armed struggle where,' and only where, it was then under way; and to lift what might be called an historica1 ban by an aggressive and crude formulation of that which was on1y just able to ho1d in check.,,6 Debray is arguing against the 1ine of "self-defense" which has been accepted by certain Latin American Communist Parties as the major path toward· national 1iberation. Gilberto Vieira's writings serve as an examp1e. "Mass se1f-defense is a feature of the popu1ar movement in Columbia. It is an integra1 part of SRegis Debray, Revo1utio~ in the Revolution? (New York Month1y Review Press, 1967), p. 60. (Hereafter cited as Revolution). 6Regis Debray, "A Rep1y", (Month1y Review, Vol. 20, No. 9), p. 14 (hereafter cited as Rep1y). 5 the revolutionary process •••• In our conditions mass defense is a combination of the peaceful and non-peace­ f~l way.,,7 Debray becomes very specifie when he says, When l drafted the booklet, the specifie question of the antagonism People's War/ Communist Parties had arisen in a polemic form for comrades in specifie countries - Venezuela and Guatemala - and in a specifie period, from approximate1y 1964 on. This question was suspect and disconcerting because historically ne~T; and wherever it was posed by events, it crysta11ized the most important facet of the contradiction between the re­ formist 1ine and the consistent 1ine. Thus it became the vital question within the armed revo1utionary movement in the precise sense that the very 1ife or death of the movement depended on Hs solutioll. What was required was to throw the 1ight of these experiences one upon the other, to com­ pare fai1ures and euëcesses, differences and simi1arities, so as to bring to 1ight the lessons to be drawn from them. 8 Debray's comments indicate that rather than attempt- ing to justify one specifie method of peop1e's war he is c1arifying the Cuban Revo1ution's path and placing it 7Gi1berto Vieira, "Growth of Militarism in Columbia and the Line of the C.P.", (Wor1d Marxist Review, Vol. 6 No. 4), p. 17. 8Regis Debray, Reply, op.cit., p. 15. 6 within the context of the revo1utionary movements in Latin America. In quoting from the French journal, Humanite Nouvelle, however, Peking Review describes Debray's book as, "the manifesto of a po1itical 1ine which is anti-revisionist in appearance ••• but anti­ Marxist in rea1ity. It 1eads a11 honest people dis­ gusted with revisionism to a side track, down the drain, to a blind a11ey. ,,9 The article go es ~n to cal1 Revolution in the Revolution? ·"an attack on Marxist- Leninism, Mao Tse-tung's thought, and to deny the univers al significance of Mao Tse-tung's theories."10 In order to show the importance of understanding an author's approach in the matter of 1iberation strugg1e and theory it wou1d be instructive to examine a series of criticisms of Regis Debray and see how a few commentators react to Revolution in the Revo1uton? 9peking Review, No. 30 (Ju1y 28, 1968), p. 11. 10Ibid• 7 We sha11 see that each writer has his own particu1ar approach to the question of national 1iberation and if BebrâyJ. ... ~:'"tfeem -iconocla-st1e.:· then he must be refuted. One criticism from the authors of Month1y Review wou1d seem to contradict the thesis presented by Debray and Lin Piao quoted above. "In the last analysis, it seems to us, the greatest weakness of Debray's theory is not its specifie errors and omissions, as important as they are, but its attempt to prescribe a course of action which aIl Latin !merican revolutions must fol1ow.,,11 A more fundamental criticisffi comes from another article in Regis Debray and the Latin American Revolution.
Load more

Recommended publications
  • Of Concepts and Methods "On Postisms" and Other Essays K
    Of Concepts and Methods "On Postisms" and other Essays K. Murali (Ajith) Foreign Languages Press Foreign Languages Press Collection “New Roads” #9 A collection directed by Christophe Kistler Contact – [email protected] https://foreignlanguages.press Paris, 2020 First Edition ISBN: 978-2-491182-39-7 This book is under license Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ “Communism is the riddle of history solved, and it knows itself to be this solution.” Karl Marx CONTENTS Introduction Saroj Giri From the October Revolution to the Naxalbari 1 Movement: Understanding Political Subjectivity Preface 34 On Postisms’ Concepts and Methods 36 For a Materialist Ethics 66 On the Laws of History 86 The Vanguard in the 21st Century 96 The Working of the Neo-Colonial Mind 108 If Not Reservation, Then What? 124 On the Specificities of Brahmanist Hindu Fascism 146 Some Semi-Feudal Traits of the Indian Parliamentary 160 System The Maoist Party 166 Re-Reading Marx on British India 178 The Politics of Liberation 190 Appendix In Conversation with the Journalist K. P. Sethunath 220 Introduction Introduction From the October Revolution to the Nax- albari Movement: Understanding Political Subjectivity Saroj Giri1 The first decade since the October Revolution of 1917 was an extremely fertile period in Russia. So much happened in terms of con- testing approaches and divergent paths to socialism and communism that we are yet to fully appreciate the richness, intensity and complexity of the time. In particular, what is called the Soviet revolutionary avant garde (DzigaVertov, Vladimir Mayakovsky, Alexander Rodchenko, El Lissitzky, Boris Arvatov) was extremely active during the 1920s.
    [Show full text]
  • Antagonistic and Non-Antagonistic Contradictions by Ai Siqi
    Antagonistic and Non-Antagonistic Contradictions by Ai Siqi This is a selection from Ai Siqi's book Lecture Outline on Dialectical Materialism, Beijing, 1957. This book was translated into a number of languages. The selection describes the concept of non‐antagonistic contradiction as expounded in several works by Mao Zedong. This translation is based Chinese text published in Ai Siqi's Complete Works [艾思奇全书], Beijing: People's publishing House, 2006, vol. 6, pp. 832‐836. [832] 5. Antagonistic and non-antagonistic forms of struggle The struggle of opposites is encountered in our work. It cannot use one absolute, but this principle does not at all fixed kind of form and tie itself to one rigid exclude diversity of struggle forms and method, and in this way, it is possible to methods of resolution. On the contrary, grasp revolution in a comparatively forms of struggle and methods of resolving successful way, and lead towards victory. contradictions must have various For example, in order to eliminate manifestations, depending on the quality of capitalism, our Chinese method is not to the contradiction and all kinds of different use a form of great force to expropriate the circumstances. One of the characteristics of means of production, but mainly to adopt formalism 1 is to grasp some one kind of the form of peaceful remolding to redeem struggle form and method of resolving them. contradictions in a one-sided way, and In the various sorts and varieties of regard it as a thing which is absolutely struggle forms, two different forms of impossible to change, thus committing struggle should be especially studied, subjectivist errors.
    [Show full text]
  • A Study of the Relationship Between the Black Panther Party and Maoism
    Constructing the Past Volume 10 Issue 1 Article 7 August 2009 “Concrete Analysis of Concrete Conditions”: A Study of the Relationship between the Black Panther Party and Maoism Chao Ren Illinois Wesleyan University Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/constructing Recommended Citation Ren, Chao (2009) "“Concrete Analysis of Concrete Conditions”: A Study of the Relationship between the Black Panther Party and Maoism," Constructing the Past: Vol. 10 : Iss. 1 , Article 7. Available at: https://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/constructing/vol10/iss1/7 This Article is protected by copyright and/or related rights. It has been brought to you by Digital Commons @ IWU with permission from the rights-holder(s). You are free to use this material in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s) directly, unless additional rights are indicated by a Creative Commons license in the record and/ or on the work itself. This material has been accepted for inclusion by editorial board of the Undergraduate Economic Review and the Economics Department at Illinois Wesleyan University. For more information, please contact [email protected]. ©Copyright is owned by the author of this document. “Concrete Analysis of Concrete Conditions”: A Study of the Relationship between the Black Panther Party and Maoism This article is available in Constructing the Past: https://digitalcommons.iwu.edu/constructing/vol10/iss1/7 28 Chao Ren “Concrete Analysis of Concrete Conditions”: A Study of the Relationship between the Black Panther Party and Maoism Chao Ren “…the most essential thing in Marxism, the living soul of Marxism, is the concrete analysis of concrete conditions.” — Mao Zedong, On Contradiction, April 1937 Late September, 1971.
    [Show full text]
  • Protracted People's War Is Not a Universal Strategy for Revolution
    Protracted People’s War is Not a Universal Strategy for Revolution 2018-01-19 00:42:22 -0400 Protracted People’s War (PPW) has been promoted as a universal strategy for revolution in recent years despite the fact that this directly contradicts Mao’s conclusions in his writing on revolutionary strategy. Mao emphasized PPW was possible in China because of the semi-feudal nature of Chinese society, and because of antagonistic divisions within the white regime which encircled the red base areas. Basic analysis shows that the strategy cannot be practically applied in the U.S. or other imperialist countries. Despite this, advocates for the universality of PPW claim that support for their thesis is a central principle of Maoism. In this document we refute these claims, and outline a revolutionary strategy based on an analysis of the concrete conditions of the U.S. state. In our view, confusion on foundational questions of revolutionary strategy, and lack of familiarity with Mao’s writings on the actual strategy of PPW, has led to the growth of dogmatic and ultra-“left” tendencies within the U.S. Maoist movement. Some are unaware of the nature of the struggle in the Chinese Com- munist Party (CCP) against Wang Ming, Li Lisan, and other dogmatists. As a result, they conflate Mao’s critique of an insurrectionary strategy in China with a critique of insurrection as a strategy for revolution in general. Some advocate for the formation of base areas and for guerrilla warfare in imperialist coun- tries, while others negate PPW as a concrete revolutionary strategy, reducing it to an abstract generality or a label for focoist armed struggle.
    [Show full text]
  • Critique of Maoist Reason
    Critique of Maoist Reason J. Moufawad-Paul Foreign Languages Press Foreign Languages Press Collection “New Roads” #5 A collection directed by Christophe Kistler Contact – [email protected] https://foreignlanguages.press Paris 2020 First Edition ISBN: 978-2-491182-11-3 This book is under license Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 International (CC BY-SA 4.0) https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/ Contents Introduction 1 Chapter 1 The Route Charted to Date 7 Chapter 2 Thinking Science 19 Chapter 3 The Maoist Point of Origin 35 Chapter 4 Against Communist Theology 51 Chapter 5 The Dogmato-eclecticism of “Maoist Third 69 Worldism” Chapter 6 Left and Right Opportunist Practice 87 Chapter 7 Making Revolution 95 Conclusion 104 Acknowledgements 109 Introduction Introduction In the face of critical passivity and dry formalism we must uphold our collective capacity to think thought. The multiple articulations of bourgeois reason demand that we accept the current state of affairs as natural, reducing critical thinking to that which functions within the boundaries drawn by its order. Even when we break from the diktat of this reason to pursue revolutionary projects, it is difficult to break from the way this ideological hegemony has trained us to think from the moment we were born. Since we are still more-or-less immersed in cap- italist culture––from our jobs to the media we consume––the training persists.1 Hence, while we might supersede the boundaries drawn by bourgeois reason, it remains a constant struggle to escape its imaginary. The simplicity encouraged by bourgeois reasoning––formulaic repeti- tion, a refusal to think beneath the appearance of things––thus finds its way into the reasoning of those who believe they have slipped its grasp.
    [Show full text]
  • Chinese Theories of "Anti-Modern" Or Alternative Modernity: Arif Dirlik, Liu Kang, and Wang Hui
    CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University Volume 20 (2018) Issue 3 Article 7 Chinese Theories of "Anti-Modern" or Alternative Modernity: Arif Dirlik, Liu Kang, and Wang Hui Wu Yuyu Eastern China Normal University Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb Part of the Arts and Humanities Commons Dedicated to the dissemination of scholarly and professional information, Purdue University Press selects, develops, and distributes quality resources in several key subject areas for which its parent university is famous, including business, technology, health, veterinary medicine, and other selected disciplines in the humanities and sciences. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Language Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monograph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: <[email protected]> Recommended Citation Yuyu, Wu. "Chinese Theories of "Anti-Modern" or Alternative Modernity: Arif Dirlik, Liu Kang, and Wang Hui." CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 20.3 (2018): <https://doi.org/10.7771/1481-4374.3252> This text has been double-blind peer reviewed by 2+1 experts in the field.
    [Show full text]
  • Mao's Little Red Book
    University Printing House, Cambridge CB2 8BS, United Kingdom Published in the United States of America by Cambridge University Press, New York Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge. It furthers the University’s mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of education, learning and research at the highest international levels of excellence. www.cambridge.org Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781107665644 © Cambridge University Press 2014 This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements, no reproduction of any part may take place without the written permission of Cambridge University Press. First published 2014 Printed and bound in the United Kingdom by Clays, St Ives plc A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library Library of Congress Cataloguing in Publication data Mao’s Little Red Book : a global history / edited by Alexander C. Cook. pages cm ISBN 978-1-107-05722-7 (Hardback) – ISBN 978-1-107-66564-4 (Paperback) 1. Mao, Zedong, 1893–1976. Mao zhu xi yu lu. 2. Mao, Zedong, 1893–1976–Quotations. I. Cook, Alexander C., editor. DS778.M3C68 2013 951.05092–dc23 2013034816 ISBN 978-1-107-05722-7 Hardback ISBN 978-1-107-66564-4 Paperback Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication, and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain, accurate or appropriate. Contents List of illustrations page vii List of contributors viii Preface xiii 1 Introduction: the spiritual atom bomb and its global fallout 1 alexander c.
    [Show full text]
  • Mao's "On Contradiction," Mao-Hegel/Mao-Deleuze
    CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University Volume 20 (2018) Issue 3 Article 3 Mao's "On Contradiction," Mao-Hegel/Mao-Deleuze Kenneth Surin Duke University Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb Part of the American Studies Commons, Comparative Literature Commons, Education Commons, European Languages and Societies Commons, Feminist, Gender, and Sexuality Studies Commons, Other Arts and Humanities Commons, Other Film and Media Studies Commons, Reading and Language Commons, Rhetoric and Composition Commons, Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons, Television Commons, and the Theatre and Performance Studies Commons Dedicated to the dissemination of scholarly and professional information, Purdue University Press selects, develops, and distributes quality resources in several key subject areas for which its parent university is famous, including business, technology, health, veterinary medicine, and other selected disciplines in the humanities and sciences. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities
    [Show full text]
  • No. 53, Winter-Spring 1985
    WinterISpring 1985 Issue number 53 Contents The '60s-'70sShift by BobAvakian. .. The Disarmament Mirage by R. Ulin .............................25 Not in Our Genes and the Waging of the Ideological Counteroffensive by Ardea Skybreak ......................45 The Political Anatomy of the ERA: Bourgeois Feminism and Prewar Politics by Li Onesto ...........................63 Guevara, Debray, and Armed Revisionism by Lenny Wolff........................ .85 Revolution ,ISSN 019'3-36121is the propaganda organ of the Central Committee of the Revolutionary Con~munistParty USA IRCP,USAI. Correspondence: We welcome correspondence to Revolution magazine. All letters and manuscripts should be clean CODY,.... typed and triole-s~aced. and become the property of Revolution magazine. They should be sent to: RCP Publications, P.O. Box 1317, New York, NY 10185 Subscriptions: In the U.S.: i14.OOlyear Other countries: $16.50/year-surface mail $24.00/year-air mail i20.00lyear-institutional rate Payable by check or money order. send all subscription orders to: RCP Publications, P.O. Box 3486, Merchandise Mart, Chicago, IL 60654 Readers note There was nn Fdll !W.&tssuel by Bob Avakian Chamber of Commerce Types vs. Revolutionary Nationalists Q: In "Conquer the World. ." you put forward the need to look at the '70s developments from a more international viewpoint. You raised Lin Biao's Long Live the Victoy ofPeo- pie's War and the Chinese line of that time (the late '60sl and what it has in common with the "three worlds" theory of later on. Could you expand on your thinking on what hap. pened in the '70s internationally, this whole ebb period in the movement? What happened to the movement of the '60s? Wfiat BA: Take Lin Biao Long Live the Victory ofPeople's War on the accounted for the lull of the 1970s, and the different one handand the "three worlds" theory on theother, First of character of the struggles today from what has gone all, I think the Lin Biao document is a much more revolu- before? How should that entire period be summed up so tionary document.
    [Show full text]
  • Maoist Aesthetics in Western Left-Wing Thought
    CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture ISSN 1481-4374 Purdue University Press ©Purdue University Volume 20 (2018) Issue 3 Article 4 Maoist Aesthetics in Western Left-wing Thought Jun Zeng Shanghai University Siying Duan Simon Fraser University Follow this and additional works at: https://docs.lib.purdue.edu/clcweb Part of the Chinese Studies Commons, and the Comparative Literature Commons Dedicated to the dissemination of scholarly and professional information, Purdue University Press selects, develops, and distributes quality resources in several key subject areas for which its parent university is famous, including business, technology, health, veterinary medicine, and other selected disciplines in the humanities and sciences. CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture, the peer-reviewed, full-text, and open-access learned journal in the humanities and social sciences, publishes new scholarship following tenets of the discipline of comparative literature and the field of cultural studies designated as "comparative cultural studies." Publications in the journal are indexed in the Annual Bibliography of English Language and Literature (Chadwyck-Healey), the Arts and Humanities Citation Index (Thomson Reuters ISI), the Humanities Index (Wilson), Humanities International Complete (EBSCO), the International Bibliography of the Modern Language Association of America, and Scopus (Elsevier). The journal is affiliated with the Purdue University Press monograph series of Books in Comparative Cultural Studies. Contact: <[email protected]> Recommended Citation Zeng, Jun; and Duan, Siying. "Maoist Aesthetics in Western Left-wing Thought." CLCWeb: Comparative Literature and Culture 20.3 (2018): <https://doi.org/10.7771/1481-4374.3250> This text has been double-blind peer reviewed by 2+1 experts in the field.
    [Show full text]
  • Mao Zedong's “Anarcho-Marxist” Vision Revisited*
    Mao Zedong’s “Anarcho‐Marxist” Vision Revisited* By Caleb Yankus Seminar Paper Presented to the Department of History Western Oregon University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Bachelor of Arts in History Spring 2009 Approved_______________________________________________ ______ Date___________________ Approved______________________________________________________Date___________________ HST 499: Prof. Max Geier & Prof. Narasingha Sil 2 I In 1949, after a brutal civil war, China was unified under a new party and a new political leader. Mao Zedong (1893‐1976) had navigated a treacherous political landscape to emerge as the leader of the Chinese Communist Party, CCP, and the figurehead of the entire Chinese nation. His rise to power was based on a political philosophy that was shaped by experiences from his youth and growing to adulthood in a time of upheaval and change in China. While several scholars have tried to explain Mao in terms of his Marxist orientation, the concept of “Maoism”1 shows that unlike some of his Communist contemporaries Mao’s ideals were a synthesis of traditional Chinese thought, shrewd pragmatism, and Marxist ideas. Mao’s unique approach to Marxist theory began with the traditional ideals he imbibed since his childhood. This upbringing let him see that a successful revolution in China must start with the peasants. Such a revolutionary strategy would isolate him from the Russian Communists. After joining with the Kuomintang, a powerful political party, Mao and his followers later separated from them over ideological differences. Mao had a unique approach to Marxism that was shaped during the first half of the twentieth century. Mao had a rather uneventful life as the son of a moderately well‐to‐do peasant in Hunan.
    [Show full text]
  • Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan
    Mao Tse-tung REPORT ON AN INVESTIGATION OF THE PEASANT MOVEMENT IN HUNAN From the Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung Foreign Languages Press Peking 1967 First Edition 1965 Second Printing 1967 Vol. 1, pp. 23-59. Prepared © for the Internet by David J. Romagnolo, [email protected] (May 1997) C O N T E N T S The Importance of the Peasant Problem 23 Get Organized 24 Down with the Local Tyrants and Evil Gentry! All Power to 25 the Peasant Associations! "It's Terrible!" or "It's Fine!" 26 The Question of "Going Too Far" 27 The "Movement of the Riffraff" 29 Vanguards of the Revolution 30 Fourteen Great Achievements 34 1. Organizing the Peasants into Peasant Associations 34 2. Hitting the Landlords Politcally 35 3. Hitting the Landlords Economically 39 4. Overthrowing the Feudal Rule of the Local Tyrants and Evil Gentry -- Smashing the Tu and Tuan 40 5. Overthrowing the Armed Forces of the Landlords and Establishing Those of the Peasants 41 6. Overthrowing the Political Power of the County Magistrate and His Bailiffs 42 7. Overthrowing the Clan Authority of the Ancestral Temples and Clan Elders, the Religious Authority of the Town and Village Gods, and the Masculine Authority of Husbands 44 8. Spreading Political Propaganda 47 9. Peasant Bans and Prohibitions 49 10. Eliminating Banditry 52 11. Abolishing Exhorbitant Levies 53 12. The Movement for Education 53 13. The Co-operative Movement 54 14. Building Roads and Repairing Embankments 55 56 NOTES page 23 REPORT ON AN INVESTIGATION OF THE PEASANT MOVEMENT IN HUNAN[*] March 1927 THE IMPORTANCE OF THE PEASANT PROBLEM During my recent visit to Hunan[1] I made a first-hand investigation of conditions in the five counties of Hsiangtan, Hsianghsiang, Hengshan, Liling and Changsha.
    [Show full text]